One, two, cha cha cha…

Armed with some unusual flavours in both hot and cold variety, Taiwanese chain Chatime offers a whole new experience of tea drinking to Indian customers

October 05, 2012 08:34 pm | Updated October 18, 2016 12:41 pm IST - NEW DELHI

A thirst for the new: Black tea.

A thirst for the new: Black tea.

Really, I would rather stay away from an appreciatory natter on tea. I had got an overdose of it since childhood. Over and over again, across exchanges between relatives, with neighbours, and even strangers in tea land Assam, I have heard about good tea, bad tea and then very bad tea. The observations were galore and would get pretty intricate at times. Say, I am alright with things like who makes a mean tea with bay leaves but then, who got lucky with a rich groom after making a great concoction at a function, is a bit too much for me. Same with info like which shop will always give you the best tea (rest assured, they would say!) and which variety needs less brewing, but then, how a round of bad tea can spoil a good conversation?

So you would understand when I say, with trepidation I walk into Chatime on the lower ground floor of MGF Metropolis Mall in Gurgaon. I am worried about receiving a ‘lecture’ on tea, yet again. But my hard nose softens a bit on seeing pink and white as the outlet’s dominant colours. Waiters in pink tees at the door, in the serving area and behind the counter…I heave half a sigh of relief thinking, it looks different.

Then walks up to me the Chatime manager, an affable sort, who takes it on him to introduce Chatime to me. It was a 5-6 minute monologue about the popular Taiwanese chain’s entry into India but I rather not complain. The guy has something different to talk about. Say, mixing tea with tapioca pearls, coconut jelly, yoghurt, aloe vera, brown rice and a range of fruits besides pointing at names like jasmine tea, chrysanthemum tea, oolong tea, etc. in the menu card. The pricing is from Rs. 60 to 140 for a drink before taxes.

I am offered Taiwan mango QQ first. The manager explains what is qq. “Q in Mandarin means ‘jelly’, so here you have double jelly.” One sip and I know this is real good stuff. The base is mango juice mixed with a light tea. What floats on top are black tapioca pearls plus cubes of coconut jelly. All these ingredients spring up a riot of flavours in my mouth.

Next, I go for a lemon green tea. It has an aloe vera topping. Super! The light, lemony drink with chunks of slippery aloe vera coming in between works for me. I also take some sips from yet another great concoction of green tea and yoghurt. It gives the taste similar to Yakult. “If you like yoghurt, then this is definitely your drink,” says the manager and I agree.

I go on to try out a hot variety too, it is the jasmine green tea. The light brown brew is ideal for those who want the real thing. What’s best is, their serving time is only two to three minutes and the plastic cups they are served in are rather sturdy and leak proof, so you can take it with you without any fear of spilling the content. “Ideally, each drink should be finished within two hours of serving for the best taste,” adds the manager. The purple straws are pretty thick and easily brings to your mouth the jelly chunks.

One more good news about Chatime is, it has a range of some of the most amazing snow ice. The snow ice machine, displayed at the counter, looks like a snowman. And what great stuff it makes! I try out the roasted peanut chocolate snow ice. A bowl of richness! The wafer thin sheets of ice look like a cloth with fine pleats. And they so easily melt in the mouth. Its candy yoghurt mango snow ice is yummy too. It comes topped with colourful gems, raisins and slices of ripe mango. The servings are pretty substantial.

I learn that Chatime has been brought to India by an F and B group called Alchemist. The company COO A.K. Sikant later tells me, though the typical customer profile of bubble tea stores worldwide tends to be the teenager/young adult segment, its base is across all age groups in India. “Our target group is those young at heart.” Sikant says it is planning to open 150 outlets over the next five years in India, with 10 of them opening in the first year itself.

After the Gurgaon outlet, it is starting one store in the Sarojini Nagar market this month. The third outlet is likely to be in Noida Sector 18 market. “We are in dialogue with property owners at prominent high street locations and with malls in the NCR where you will see our next few outlets opening very shortly,” he says.

Well, I am waiting. And also thinking of flummoxing some of my old relatives at last with a talk on endless possibilities of tea.

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